On Wednesday, I had an interview for a really cool educator position that teaches kids how to make podcasts. I had to teach a very short writing lesson as part of my interview, so I prepared a lesson on personal narrative writing with the prompt of telling a story of either meeting a hero or feeling supported by a family or friend. Anyways, my example was of the time I met you, about a year before lockdown in LA on the Keep Going tour. I couldn’t hold my emotions in and you said when you cry you like to get ice cream.
I was going to be really early to my interview, so without really giving it much thought, I bought some ice cream and ate it while I waited for a more appropriate amount of being early. I won’t know if I got the job for about another week while they check my references, but I just wanted to let you know again how much your work has impacted me, Austin.
I’m currently running a book club with my arts collective on Corita Kent’s Learning by Heart. Someone asked me how I chose the book and that it’s so powerful and I said I was working up my artistic lineage from you. I think we’ll do Making Comics by Lynda Barry next. We do a lot of other cool stuff too, and we’re going to be in an article by the local NPR station this month.
I told someone else last night the reasons I am an artist now are LA Zine Fest, my favorite musician Porter Robinson, and you. I think the year we met is when I started to take art seriously. Now my arts collective is preparing to open a space. I’ve thought of this dream of an arts space for over a decade, been working on this specific project over different iterations for 4 years almost, and my dream feels closer than ever. Thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you!
I’ve been excited for what comes next for you for quite some time, and I look forward to Tuesday and Friday. I hope you continue to take your time and you will inspire countless people in the meantime. I don’t know for sure that I’ll get the job I mentioned in the beginning, but I was really happy with my interview, especially the paragraph I shared about meeting you. Thanks again
Fallout! I should not have liked it, as it is made up of things I generally don't enjoy -- graphic violence, gross-out images, and a certain type of video-game. But I LOVED it! Can't wait for the next season!
I’m a middle school librarian, so I read a lot of YA. I loved The Seventh Most Important Thing by Holly Sloan. Really beautiful book. Also the book When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead is crazy good and a somewhat weird. Actually there are thousands of great books for young people, these are just two I read recently that have stuck with me.
"Tiny Beautiful Things, Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar," is written by Cheryl Strayed...a wonderful writer who gives advice. She also authored the best selling memoir, "Wild." But "Tiny..." it's not your typical advice column. She's sassy, totally upfront, and sees beneath the surface. This was my second read through, and it held up perfectly, and buoyed my spirits.
Books: I've been reading almost exclusively romance for a little over a year, with no regrets. I strongly recommend Joanna Shupe's Uptown Girls series. It's about three sisters living in Gilded Age New York and chafing against the society life their parents expect them to live. The eldest is trying to live up to her parents' expectations as a bargain so that her sisters don't have to. The middle sister wants to open a casino for women. The youngest does charity work and tracks down wife deserters and forces them to support their wives and children. Three excellent books: The Rogue of Fifth Avenue, The Prince of Broadway, The Devil of Downtown.
I also loved Leigh Bardugo's The Familiar, about a Jewish converso woman in Spain during the Inquisition who works as a servant to a noble family and discovers she can do magic. It's technically not a romance, but it has a romance plotline in it. The magic and historical detail are both so cool.
Stephen Fry reading Sherlock Holmes serenades me to sleep every night.
Music: Taylor Swift's song, "I Can Do It with a Broken Heart," which is a bop but has sad lyrics. My favorite lines are "I'm so depressed I act like it's my birthday every day" and "I cry a lot but I am so productive."
TV: Star Trek: Discovery finished beautifully. Apple TV's Loot, where Maya Rudolph plays a billionaire divorcee who decides to actually work at the foundation that bears her name.
Documentary: Jim Henson: Idea Man is excellent and helped me realize that he's a critical part of my creative lineage.
Podcasts: Fated Mates, a deep dive into the romance genre where the hosts dig into the history of the genre and the work it does.
Tabletop games: Honey Heist - a roleplaying game where you are a bear and a criminal and you must pull off a huge heist. Flamecraft - a board game about pairing shop owners with artisan dragons. Beautiful components and adorable art.
Love that you saw Heavy Metal Parking Lot! I saw Judas Priest and Dokken on that tour, but at their New Jersey show. The documentary is equally nostalgic and cringeworthy for me.
I've been watching Extraordinary, which has been so much fun. And the new season of The Bear.
Judy Chicago wrote a manuscript in 1974- Revelations- finally published as the Catalogue for her latest exhibition in London. She had lost hope of ever seeing it coming out of her drawer. Hans Ulrich Obrist went to her studio and asked her: What is something you would like to see in your exhibition that you were never able to show?
I am reading it right now, and it’s about the history of the goddess worship and how it disappeared in the coming of patriarchal religions designed to control women and existing freedoms and cultural roots based in matriarchal societies.
Best book I read this year: Art Monsters- Unruly Bodies In Feminist Art- Lauren Elkin
Hi Austin. Love your recommendations. Thanks! I enjoyed the Hans Zimmer doc too. I thought the score for the Dune movies was amazing. My favourite kind of documentaries are about people who are doing a thing they love (Bill Cunningham New York is one of my enduring favourites). I am so glad to be a subscriber to your page. It is a genuine pleasure, and I am learning lots about the creative process.
My best things also all happen to be very recent things.
I just finished TJ Klune's "Under the Whispering Door" which took me all of this year to get through the first 3rd, then swept me away and I devoured it over 4th of July weekend. So beautiful and adds to this quiet collection of books about grief that I have going (including my own last novel).
I've been listening a lot to Linkin Park's "Papercuts" singles collection that just came out, including an instrumental version of the whole thing that's only available digitally. It's been my working companion this last week. Green Day's "Saviors" and Atreyu's "The Beautiful Dark of Life" have also been stellar this year.
My love of Critical Role has returned with gusto this year as well and their new Beacon streaming service has abridged editions of the episodes that are allowing me to get caught back up in a reasonable way.
And zines, in all shapes and sizes, have been by far my overall "this is the best" thing this year. I've been buying them, reading them, and making my own and the immediacy of the medium is such a thrilling, romantic, tactile, honest, fun, whimsical, engaging experience.
My bathroom books are David Fox’s Comedy ( Love it!) and The Personal Librarian ( based on a true story of a Black woman passing for white), she was JP Morgan’s personal librarian. Also listened to several romance novels by Jasmine Guillory, Denise Williams, and Christina C Jones because I’m writing a romance comedy novel.
I read a book How Art Can Make You Happy by Bridget Watson Payne, and Art Rules: How Great Artists Think, Create, and Work. I’m finally finishing Black Count by Tom Reiss about General Alex Dumas, the father of Alexandre Dumas author of The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers.
I’m listening to David McCullogh’s The Pioneers, the settlement of what would become Ohio, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin. I found it fascinating that they insisted on freedom of religion, free universal education, and the prohibition of slavery. This was 1788!
I have made myself an “Undercover Artist.” I take a pocket sketchbook everywhere and draw people at cafes, the airport, and at the dog park, the dogs.
I continue to follow the lessons @wendymacnaughton . This week was week three of pencil skills.
I discovered October London and his album The Rebirth of Marvin. He sounds just like Marvin Gaye!
And I decided to take a sculpture class. I didn’t read the description of the class and was surprised that we have a live model. When he removed his shorts and struck a pose, I called on my medical training to keep my face impassive and matter of fact. 🤦🏽♀️😆
Lots to consider adding to my TBR & TBW lists. I don’t listen to many podcasts, either, but Welcome to Night Vale always brightens my drive to work if the traffic is slow.
On Wednesday, I had an interview for a really cool educator position that teaches kids how to make podcasts. I had to teach a very short writing lesson as part of my interview, so I prepared a lesson on personal narrative writing with the prompt of telling a story of either meeting a hero or feeling supported by a family or friend. Anyways, my example was of the time I met you, about a year before lockdown in LA on the Keep Going tour. I couldn’t hold my emotions in and you said when you cry you like to get ice cream.
I was going to be really early to my interview, so without really giving it much thought, I bought some ice cream and ate it while I waited for a more appropriate amount of being early. I won’t know if I got the job for about another week while they check my references, but I just wanted to let you know again how much your work has impacted me, Austin.
I’m currently running a book club with my arts collective on Corita Kent’s Learning by Heart. Someone asked me how I chose the book and that it’s so powerful and I said I was working up my artistic lineage from you. I think we’ll do Making Comics by Lynda Barry next. We do a lot of other cool stuff too, and we’re going to be in an article by the local NPR station this month.
I told someone else last night the reasons I am an artist now are LA Zine Fest, my favorite musician Porter Robinson, and you. I think the year we met is when I started to take art seriously. Now my arts collective is preparing to open a space. I’ve thought of this dream of an arts space for over a decade, been working on this specific project over different iterations for 4 years almost, and my dream feels closer than ever. Thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you!
I’ve been excited for what comes next for you for quite some time, and I look forward to Tuesday and Friday. I hope you continue to take your time and you will inspire countless people in the meantime. I don’t know for sure that I’ll get the job I mentioned in the beginning, but I was really happy with my interview, especially the paragraph I shared about meeting you. Thanks again
Thank you for all this — I am rooting for you! :) And I'm so glad you're reading Corita and Lynda. They have taught me so much.
Best of luck on the job prospect! They would be so lucky to have you! 😊
Fallout! I should not have liked it, as it is made up of things I generally don't enjoy -- graphic violence, gross-out images, and a certain type of video-game. But I LOVED it! Can't wait for the next season!
I’m a middle school librarian, so I read a lot of YA. I loved The Seventh Most Important Thing by Holly Sloan. Really beautiful book. Also the book When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead is crazy good and a somewhat weird. Actually there are thousands of great books for young people, these are just two I read recently that have stuck with me.
Thank you for sharing your lists.
"Tiny Beautiful Things, Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar," is written by Cheryl Strayed...a wonderful writer who gives advice. She also authored the best selling memoir, "Wild." But "Tiny..." it's not your typical advice column. She's sassy, totally upfront, and sees beneath the surface. This was my second read through, and it held up perfectly, and buoyed my spirits.
The Gilot memoir was eye-opening. Hope you’re enjoying it.
Here we go...
Books: I've been reading almost exclusively romance for a little over a year, with no regrets. I strongly recommend Joanna Shupe's Uptown Girls series. It's about three sisters living in Gilded Age New York and chafing against the society life their parents expect them to live. The eldest is trying to live up to her parents' expectations as a bargain so that her sisters don't have to. The middle sister wants to open a casino for women. The youngest does charity work and tracks down wife deserters and forces them to support their wives and children. Three excellent books: The Rogue of Fifth Avenue, The Prince of Broadway, The Devil of Downtown.
I also loved Leigh Bardugo's The Familiar, about a Jewish converso woman in Spain during the Inquisition who works as a servant to a noble family and discovers she can do magic. It's technically not a romance, but it has a romance plotline in it. The magic and historical detail are both so cool.
Stephen Fry reading Sherlock Holmes serenades me to sleep every night.
Music: Taylor Swift's song, "I Can Do It with a Broken Heart," which is a bop but has sad lyrics. My favorite lines are "I'm so depressed I act like it's my birthday every day" and "I cry a lot but I am so productive."
TV: Star Trek: Discovery finished beautifully. Apple TV's Loot, where Maya Rudolph plays a billionaire divorcee who decides to actually work at the foundation that bears her name.
Documentary: Jim Henson: Idea Man is excellent and helped me realize that he's a critical part of my creative lineage.
Podcasts: Fated Mates, a deep dive into the romance genre where the hosts dig into the history of the genre and the work it does.
Tabletop games: Honey Heist - a roleplaying game where you are a bear and a criminal and you must pull off a huge heist. Flamecraft - a board game about pairing shop owners with artisan dragons. Beautiful components and adorable art.
Love that you saw Heavy Metal Parking Lot! I saw Judas Priest and Dokken on that tour, but at their New Jersey show. The documentary is equally nostalgic and cringeworthy for me.
I've been watching Extraordinary, which has been so much fun. And the new season of The Bear.
Judy Chicago wrote a manuscript in 1974- Revelations- finally published as the Catalogue for her latest exhibition in London. She had lost hope of ever seeing it coming out of her drawer. Hans Ulrich Obrist went to her studio and asked her: What is something you would like to see in your exhibition that you were never able to show?
I am reading it right now, and it’s about the history of the goddess worship and how it disappeared in the coming of patriarchal religions designed to control women and existing freedoms and cultural roots based in matriarchal societies.
Best book I read this year: Art Monsters- Unruly Bodies In Feminist Art- Lauren Elkin
Hi Austin. Love your recommendations. Thanks! I enjoyed the Hans Zimmer doc too. I thought the score for the Dune movies was amazing. My favourite kind of documentaries are about people who are doing a thing they love (Bill Cunningham New York is one of my enduring favourites). I am so glad to be a subscriber to your page. It is a genuine pleasure, and I am learning lots about the creative process.
I wish I had a better system to keep track of all the things I've enjoyed, beyond GoodReads for books.
My best things also all happen to be very recent things.
I just finished TJ Klune's "Under the Whispering Door" which took me all of this year to get through the first 3rd, then swept me away and I devoured it over 4th of July weekend. So beautiful and adds to this quiet collection of books about grief that I have going (including my own last novel).
I've been listening a lot to Linkin Park's "Papercuts" singles collection that just came out, including an instrumental version of the whole thing that's only available digitally. It's been my working companion this last week. Green Day's "Saviors" and Atreyu's "The Beautiful Dark of Life" have also been stellar this year.
My love of Critical Role has returned with gusto this year as well and their new Beacon streaming service has abridged editions of the episodes that are allowing me to get caught back up in a reasonable way.
And zines, in all shapes and sizes, have been by far my overall "this is the best" thing this year. I've been buying them, reading them, and making my own and the immediacy of the medium is such a thrilling, romantic, tactile, honest, fun, whimsical, engaging experience.
Hey-- your "on this day" links from previous years has disappeared from your website. Did you mean to do that?
They're still showing up for me — maybe you checked on a day I'd never posted?
Nope-- it has been three or four days -- no sidebars.
no sidebars at all? are you looking on your phone or the computer?
On my computer. Still not there today (July 18).
truly baffling. can you take a screenshot and send it to me? have you tried another browser?
No sidebars on Google Chrome but they do show up on Firefox.
What a fun dad you are!
My bathroom books are David Fox’s Comedy ( Love it!) and The Personal Librarian ( based on a true story of a Black woman passing for white), she was JP Morgan’s personal librarian. Also listened to several romance novels by Jasmine Guillory, Denise Williams, and Christina C Jones because I’m writing a romance comedy novel.
I read a book How Art Can Make You Happy by Bridget Watson Payne, and Art Rules: How Great Artists Think, Create, and Work. I’m finally finishing Black Count by Tom Reiss about General Alex Dumas, the father of Alexandre Dumas author of The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers.
I’m listening to David McCullogh’s The Pioneers, the settlement of what would become Ohio, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin. I found it fascinating that they insisted on freedom of religion, free universal education, and the prohibition of slavery. This was 1788!
I have made myself an “Undercover Artist.” I take a pocket sketchbook everywhere and draw people at cafes, the airport, and at the dog park, the dogs.
I continue to follow the lessons @wendymacnaughton . This week was week three of pencil skills.
I discovered October London and his album The Rebirth of Marvin. He sounds just like Marvin Gaye!
And I decided to take a sculpture class. I didn’t read the description of the class and was surprised that we have a live model. When he removed his shorts and struck a pose, I called on my medical training to keep my face impassive and matter of fact. 🤦🏽♀️😆
Lots to consider adding to my TBR & TBW lists. I don’t listen to many podcasts, either, but Welcome to Night Vale always brightens my drive to work if the traffic is slow.
I must stand up for my 30 year old Pelican pen. It knows my hand.